A new language called WebAssembly is opening the door to the next generation of browsers

A still frame from a moving, generated landscape inside a browser using WASM

If you think of the online world as browser experiences versus app experiences, get ready to redraw your boundaries.

Mozilla, Google, Microsoft, Apple and others are excited about a newly emerging open programming tool that could help to radically transform web browsers into platforms for app-like experiences.

Called WebAssembly (WASM), it’s an assembly language for browsers that allows developers to write their applications in the popular C/C++ and then compile them for use in browsers.

This means:

• dramatically decreased downloading times, so complex experiences — even highly detailed video games — can be quickly downloaded into a browser.
• and much faster performance than HTML and JavaScript, although it can work alongside them.

The increase in performance is so great that major game-oriented software firms like Epic and Unity are experimenting with WebAssembly to re-create some of their challenging experiences inside a browser.

[Read the full article on MarTech Today.]

About The Author

Barry Levine

Barry Levine covers marketing technology for Third Door Media. Previously, he covered this space as a Senior Writer for VentureBeat, and he has written about these and other tech subjects for such publications as CMSWire and NewsFactor. He founded and led the web site/unit at PBS station Thirteen/WNET; worked as an online Senior Producer/writer for Viacom; created a successful interactive game, PLAY IT BY EAR: The First CD Game; founded and led an independent film showcase, CENTER SCREEN, based at Harvard and M.I.T.; and served over five years as a consultant to the M.I.T. Media Lab. You can find him at LinkedIn, and on Twitter at xBarryLevine.

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